Did the EPA create the bedbug revival?

posted at 10:55 am on August 30, 2010 by Ed Morrissey

If it seems as though bedbugs come from another era, it’s because they generally do. In the US, the parasitic creatures had all but disappeared, thanks to pesticide applications after World War II. However, the EPA has banned the most effective pesticides that deal with bedbugs, and according to the Daily Caller, the approved list mainly stuns them into two-week stupors rather than eradicating them:

Around when bed bugs started their resurgence, Congress passed a major pesticides law in 1996 and the Clinton EPA banned several classes of chemicals that had been effective bed bug killers.

The debate isn’t over long-banned DDT, since modern bed bugs have developed a tolerance for that chemical. But in the pre-1996 regime, experts say, bed bugs were “collateral damage” from broader and more aggressive use of now-banned pesticides like Malathion and Propoxur.

Now some health officials are clamoring to bring those chemicals back to help solve the bed bug “emergency.” Meanwhile, EPA bureaucrats have downplayed the idea and environmentalists are pushing hard against the effort, citing safety concerns.

The issue has led to a standoff between Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, a Democrat, and EPA chief Lisa Jackson, who shot down Strickland’s appeals over the issue in a tersely worded letter in June.

The Jackson response rises to the level of bureaucratic art. Strickland’s state has become one of the main battlegrounds against bedbugs, and children are particularly vulnerable. Rather than issue a limited waiver for the use of Propoxur to eradicate the parasites, Jackson denies it on the basis of its impact on children — as though the application couldn’t be mitigated with proper access control and training. Instead of allowing Ohio to use an effective eradication agent, Jackson offers $550,000 in “community outreach” funds, saying — I kid you not — “education and outreach are key components to bed bug control on a community-wide basis.”

Who knew education and outreach could be so toxic? Those bedbugs should be shaking in, er, our beds.

Instead, the EPA only allows a few weak-tea pesticides to be used in battling the bedbugs. For Star Trek fans, think of it as attempting to fight with phasers set to stun:

According to research at the University of Kentucky College of Agriculture, academic headquarters for studying the six-legged beast, some strands of bed bugs can survive, zombie-like, for up to 16 days after being directly sprayed with currently used pesticides.

If you consider that in most instances insects are intended to die shortly after coming into brief contact with pesticide residue, that’s pretty dramatic.

It’s not just dramatic, it creates a repeating problem. Using approved pesticides will likely bring immediate relief from the problem, but that relief is a mere deception. Once the effects wear off, the same bugs will become active again within two weeks, recreating the problem all over again, and forcing victims to pay over and over again for applications of useless pesticides rather than solving the problem the first time with a pesticide that works.

It’s yet another demonstration of clueless government bureaucracy, unwilling to understand the needs of its citizens. We don’t need to let the bedbugs bite when we have the means necessary to eradicate them.

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I kill for a living and have for some 22 years now. I watched the Bedbugs come crawling over the last 12 or 13 years here in Alaska and no one cared, ’til now. Now that their numbers are doubling every few months people are getting interested.
I called our EPA guys up here about a month ago to ask about possible new products for treating the beggars and they said, “What outbreak?”.
sigh….

I suffered a bedbug infestation about four years ago. It took weeks to get rid of the little SOBs and months before I could relax in bed again with any confidence that they weren’t coming back.

So when considering the harmful effects of pesticide, it’s also important to consider the harmful effects of going months without restful sleep.

Bedbugs make you go kind of insane, because they feed on you in your most vulnerable moments. Just try to relax knowing that they’re going to crawl out of the woodworks and start feasting on you at 5:00 in the morning.

“It is a violation of federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling.” Yep…it sure is…sure enough…and I bet those bedbugs have got the EPA’s phone number in their little Rolodex.

I agree with you. A two page letter to say “no” doesn’t exactly sound terse to me. I’d guess that Jonathan Strong meant something along the lines of “tensely,” which is a little clumsy, too. Best to avoid adverbs as a rule anyway.

Does anyone but me wonder why all these things that were eradicated many years ago are starting to appear again, lice,bedbugs,food contamination, and are dealt with like it is a normal thing, these are things that are normal in third world countries, is that what we are now???

I was just looking at a system called “Cryonite”.
It’s nothing more than CO2. Released in to cracks and crevices where the beggars hide it freezes their bodies, fluids and kills em’ right freakin’ now. As long as contact is made they die.
You can also cook em’. There are systems for raising the temp in excess of 120 degrees Fahrenheit. Anything in excess of 120 for 20 minutes kills all bugs including Bedbugs. The trick is to get the heat to penetrate to the center of whatever their hiding in.
Hmmm…I wonder if a bait system using poisoned blood could be created… Kinda gross but…if they would feed on it…? There’s prolly someone out there working on such a system…I hope.

Ironically, Tetram and other cholinesterase inhibitors were found in the 1950′s to be uniquely effective against mites.

Unfortunately, most insecticides tend to be nerve agents which are basically deadly to anything carelessly exposed to them.

Of course in the US, it is possible to have trained individuals carefuly deploy otherwise-hazardous chemicals… if the government would use logic.

But no, they don’t trust Americans, (those chumps outside the political class) to deploy chemicals without killing people, so they would much rather have the bugs kill people and create a crisis that they may exploit.

But don’t worry. Somehow the political class will survive the mites with careful use of exemptions and grandfathering.

After all, its one thing to not pay taxes like all those other chumps, but it’s a whole other thing to have to get bitten by pests like those commoner-filth, racist plant-murderers that slave for the political class.

A buddy of mine was afflicted by bedbugs. His back looked like he’d been stabbed repeatedly by a pen-knife. He said the pain was amazing. Everyone in his apartment complex was afflicted. It messed with his nervous system so badly he thought he was being bitten constantly during the day. I can’t imagine how badly young children would be affected. Can you?